Sometimes in technology, the design of a product can have an impact
beyond just the tool itself, and that’s easily the case with the Akai
MPC. Even if you aren’t part of the device’s cult-like following, you’ve
likely worked with software influenced by its approach to musical
interaction. While we await the coming of creator Roger Linn’s new
collaboration with Dave Smith, the LinnDrum II, it’s great to look back
at the MPC itself, and the artists who stretched it to its musical
limits, from hip-hop to classical. Current TV has a short documentary
they’ve just sent us.

Current’s Parisa Vahdatinia describes it thusly:

I’d like to share with you a short piece we recently
produced here at Current TV all about the MPC–a brief history, how it
was created by Roger Linn, and how it’s effected contemporary music,
followed with some interviews with Damu The Fudgemunk, P-Fritz,
K-Murdock who share their sentiments on how the MPC has shaped their
music.

I’m just going to have to imagine how great this piece is as
I’m stuck on a train with only phone-as-modem access, so you get to
sort of scoop me. As I wait, there are some great comments up there
already, haiku-like:

“I mistook them for drum machines….”

“mpc is the hip hop guitar!”

Couldn’t have said it better myself. But it raises the question,
given the endless variety of even pre-digital musical instruments,
what’s next? That’s a question I know Roger cares about, which is why he
helped us judge a design challenge last spring. I’m personally excited
by the idea that some designs are already here, and more are likely to
come out of someone’s studio, without the major product maker label on
it.

Okay, now I’ve seen it. Good to be back off
the train and able to download videos. It does come off strangely as an
ad for Akai, but there’s another way to look at it — as an executive
summary of how MPC users describe their axe. Talk to any MPC user, and
you get a case study in why the design of integrated hardware matters to
people. I believe those principles are absolutely applicable to the
design of software, as well. And the immediacy of the monome is entirely
related, as a computer-based instrument, to the MPC as a hardware
instrument. It’s easy to get hung up on the philosophy of instruments,
but what really matters to people is (surprise) sound and how they
manipulate it.